Historic Reintroduction: India gears up to send wild tigers to Cambodia
India is undertaking a groundbreaking initiative to airlift six Royal Bengal tigers from India to Cambodia's Cardamom Mountains, marking the world's first international wild tiger reintroduction. This ambitious project, following India's successful cheetah reintroduction, aims to restore the tiger population in Cambodia, where the species was declared extinct in 2016. The relocation involves rigorous site selection in India and careful planning to ensure the tigers' survival and integration.
New Delhi: As we mark International Tiger Day, India is set to take a historic step towards wildlife conservation. It is expected to airlift six of its Royal Bengal tigers to Cambodia in a few months from now. The wild tigers are likely to be sent to Cardamom Mountains, a place where the big striped cat was declared extinct in 2016.
This will become the first international reintroduction of wild tigers across the world. The project aims to reintroduce the top predator to Cambodia’s jungles.
In September 2017, the Cambodian government, with backing from WWF, announced plans to reintroduce tigers into the country. It was in November 2022 that New Delhi and Phnom Penh had signed an agreement for the world’s first transnational tiger reintroduction.
Poaching, habitat loss, and other threats drove extinction of tigers in Cambodia. India is working to ensure that these issues are addressed and that conditions are suitable for the successful reintroduction of tigers.
Wildlife scientists are reportedly evaluating areas in Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Karnataka for its Cambodia project. Madhya Pradesh is one of the tiger hotspots -- with Kanha, Bandhavgarh, and Pench reserves . Selection will be based on genetic profiling, behavioural characteristics, and ecological compatibility.
Earlier, in May 20O4, officials from Cambodia, the National Tiger Conservation Authority, and the ambassador of India to Cambodia, Devyani Khobragade, participated in an online meeting. They had discussed the proposal to send four tigers to Cambodia by November-December then. However, the project got delayed due to some reason.
The tiger transfer project comes after India's 2022 cheetah reintroduction from Africa. But tigers require far greater territorial stability and prey biomass in abundance.
The latest government data reveals that India had 3,682 tigers in 2022 — over 70% of the world’s wild tiger population. Project Tiger, launched on April 1, 1973, was India’s flagship initiative to conserve the species. It began with nine tiger reserves covering 18,278 sq km. Currently, the country has 53 reserves spanning more than 75,000 sq km, or roughly 2.4% of its total land area.